The image is taken by Kevin Carter named “the vulture and the little girl” In the image is a starved boy, initially believed to be a girl who had collapsed due to starvation. In the background it appears to be a vulture eyeing him from nearby. It first appeared in The new York times. His photograph is a message to the people who are living in first world countries and showing the damage of world hunger.
The background looks very dry with not much life or plants growing and a hungry vulture keeping its eyes on the starving child. The appearance of the vulture is clearly stronger then the child. But in order of getting the ‘perfect shot’ Carter ignored his responsibility of helping the struggling girl but later chased the vulture off.
The process of creating cyanotypes was first discovered by Sir John Herschel in 1842, he did not consider it to be a way of creating art, but merely a way to reproduce notes.
Cyanotypes are made by mixing ferric ammonium citrate and potassium ferricyanide to create a light-sensitive solution, which is then applied to a piece of paper. When you wish to produce an image, you would place an object onto, or above, the paper under a light source to create a shadow, the shadow projected onto the paper would shield the light-sensitive solution from light, allowing the shadow to mark the paper. After a few minutes, you would put the paper in either water or another desensitising chemical so it would stop the process, leaving an image. Cyanotypes can be reproduced, these are called blueprints.
As an Art-Form
Cyanotype images appear as different shades of blue with little detail within the shapes created, this allows, for example, plant life to appear familiar yet different. As cyanotypes use shadows as a way of marking the paper, the shapes created are usually clear and easily interpreted, the simplicity of these images, in both colour and shape, allows them to be easily appreciated and understood as an art form.
Anna Atkins
Atkins was a 19th century botanist who became known as one of the first people to publish a book with photographic illustrations, as well as the first female photographer. She published her book: Photographs of British Algae: Cyanotype Impressions in late 1843, which contained cyanotype images of algae or seaweed. Atkins also published a number of fiction novels in her later years.
Christiana Z. Anderson
Anderson is a photographer who uses several 19th century photographic processes such as Cyanotypes, Salted Paper, Gum Bichromate and Palladium. Her work has had several exhibitions in multiple countries and she has also published many books about how she creates images using these older methods.
The Cyanotype process was discovered in 1842 by Sir John Herschel, an English inventor. Herschel’s process leaves us with a white print on a blue background made by items found in nature. Cyanotypes work on a variety of surfaces but, being a textile artist, I use natural fibre fabrics, usually silk or cotton but also linen, hemp, rayon and silk/viscose velvet sometimes.
Cyanotypes as an art form
Anna Atkins, a botanical artist from Tonbridge made history with her cyanotypes as some say her cyanotypes created the first ever book to hold photographs, it has also been said that she was the first female photographer.
Atkins used a mix of exposure and chemicals to create her masterpieces which were mainly prints of flowers, plants from both land and sea. Anna Atkins images merged science and art, it also progressed the use of photographs in books.
My Cyanotype
For my cyanotype I collected plants, feathers and leaves from around Hamptonne. I enjoyed making these and found them very interesting as you can create anything you think of.
Photography began in the late 1830s in France. Joseph Nicéphore Niépce used a portable camera to expose a pewter plate coated with bitumen to light. This is the first recorded image that did not fade quickly.
Although the first camera wasn’t created until the 19th century, the concept of photography has been around since about the 5th century B.C. It wasn’t until an Iraqi scientist developed something called the camera obscura in the 11th century that the art was born. The camera obscura consisted of a tent with a pinhole which projected images onto the surface of the tent, upside down, they could be traced to create accurate drawings of real objects such as buildings.
Niépce’s success led to a number of other experiments and photography progressed rapidly. Three different techniques were quickly created known as, Daguerreotypes, Emulsion Plates and Dry Plates.
A daguerreotype consisted of a copper plate being exposed to iodine vapour, and then exposed to light for roughly 15 minutes. This was a very popular method until 1850 when it was replaced with emulsion plates. Emulsion plates, were less expensive than daguerreotypes and required only two or three seconds of exposure time. This made them more efficient for portrait photographs, which were the most common photographs in this time period.
Photography was only for professionals and the rich until George Eastman started a company called Kodak in the 1880s. They created an affordable portable camera in 1888 known as the Brownie, the creation of this camera made photography very popular around the world as it was now affordable for the average person, and very easy to use.
In the 1980s and 90s companies such as kodak started creating cameras that held photos digitally compared to film, this started what photography is today.
Comparing these two images you can see that photography has clearly come along way, just 139 years after the first photograph was taken, we managed to take a picture of Earth.
Photography, as we know it today, began in the late 1830s in France. Joseph Nicéphore Niépce used a portable camera obscura to expose a pewter plate coated with bitumen to light. This is the first recorded image that did not fade quickly.
Niépce called his process heliography, from the Greek helios meaning ‘drawing with the sun’. In 1826, using this process, Niépce took the earliest surviving ‘photograph’. The photo was taken from his window in his house in Chalons-sur-Saône which required an exposure of about 8 hours.
What was photography first used for?
At first, photography was either used as an aid in the work of an painter or followed the same principles the painters followed. The first publicly recognized portraits were usually portraits of one person, or family portraits.
Photography in WW2
Wartime photography became much more graphic in World War II. 37 print and photo journalists were killed in World War II, 112 were wounded, and 50 were taken prisoner. The casualty rate among wartime journalists was four times higher than among soldiers.
Hamptonne Country Life Museum gives the visitor a unique insight into the rural life in jersey. There are different houses that make up Hamptonne, which give you an idea of how houses looked in different time periods. There is lots of old machinery like apple crushing machines, where they famously make Jersey black butter. There are many animals around hamptonne, such as pigs, cows, sheep, chickens and rabbits.
The hamptonne farm is named after laurens hamptonne, who bought the property in 1633. Hamptonne is also known as La Patente, (the name of one of the roads that passes it) , after the grants by letters patent received by its owner richard langois in 1445 and by king charles II to laurens Hamptonne in 1649.
those who has provided a particular service in the monarch or close relative were awared royal patents. Hamptonne was a vicomte or executive officer of jerseys royal court.It was in that role that Hamptonne issued the famous Proclamation in St Helier’s Royal Square on 17 February 1649, declaring Charles II as King after news reached the Island of the execution of Charles I.
The Hamptonne country life museum is a 15th century house and farm which gives visitors an insight into the rural life which was carried out in Jersey.
Things To Do On Your Visit:
You can explore the cider barn take a walk through the apple orchard meet the farm animals and take a walk inside the Syvert house which is a decorated and furnished farm house which gives visitors a 1940s feel of what life in jersey was like during the German occupation.
you also get the chance to meet characters from the past and learn about their jobs.
Location: located in the middle of the parish St Lawrence the Hamptonne is engulfed by the country side of jersey this location allows for a true feel of what it was like to be living in jersey in the 15th century. This also allows for a calm and relaxing environment whilst visiting the museum.
Tom Kennedy
A jersey based photographer and film maker who’s pictures are inspired by ‘painting with light’ through the inspiration of 17th century paintings.
the camera obscura was first mentioned by Mozi who was a Chinese philosopher during the 5th century bc. He was a scientist, mathematician, astronomer and philosopher. He wrote the book of optics.
Nicephore Niepce developed heliography which he used to make the oldest surviving product of a photographic process.
Louis Daguerre was the inventer of the Daguerreotype which was the first type of modern photography.
daguerreotypes was the first commercial succesful photgraphic process.
henry fox talbot created calotypes using a sheet of paper covered in silver chloride then exposed it to light in a camera obscura where the light touched became dark.
Richard Maddox is known for his invention of lightweight gelatin negative plates for photography.
George Eastman founded the Eastman Dry Plate and Film Company. he sold the first camera the kodak in 1888 with only a 100 exposures.
Kodak (Brownie) sold for one dollar and sold 100,000 in the first year. the brownie helped start amateur photography.
the first film in a roll and flexible was made by george eastman in 1885.
in the 1950 modern digital photography. the first digital image that was produced through a computer by Russell Kirsch, it was a picture of his son.